2011 - HSC difficulty. (1 Viewer)

[Chazure]

eng paper 1 - highly variable dependent on the text you studied and whether you ever thought about places
adv eng paper 2 - slightly bit harder, module B blah blah
2u math - easier
studies of religion - ??? never even looked at past papers for sor lol. OK l guess.
eng ext 1 - generally ok. but experience probably highly vary due to like 9 different options people could take in this course. (did genre/scifi)
mod hist - generally easy. predicted most of the questions on the test, fairly straightforward
legal studies - harder than previous years. particularly MC/crime. was a bit of a curveball considering its the 1st year of a new syllabus
hist ext - this subject continually throws curveballs at me. was hard but i'm kinda used to it now.

 

[myafanatic]

What I noticed about this year's exams is that they were harder for the reason that they seemed to want you to think more; there was less "here's a syllabus dot point, enjoy" and more "here's something that isn't particularly hard but you won't have seen it before". Also, the tests seemed to have a narrower focus, which was wildly annoying - such as Economics and policies (so little on globalisation) and Geography and world cities.

Overall though:
Geography was harder
Economics was harder (in my opinion, because I think the topics tested are the hardest and MC was really tough)
English was easier
Maths was about the same
Maths Extension 1 was harder
History Extension was about the same
Ancient History was about the same

 

[loaves]

I think for a lot of subjects the BOS was finally living up to their "no prepared responses" spiel that they've been giving every year. So the questions weren't necessarily harder, just quite narrow (and so if you weren't fully prepared, it came down to luck that you had studied particularly sections).

Some subjects were easier though - Modern History especially (except for shithouse section 1).

 

[pony_magician]

Some subjects were easier though - Modern History especially (except for shithouse section 1).

Modern history basically encouraged pre-written responses.
Especially for Personality part B.

 

[danjw]

Have you guys been sitting tests from another country?. Biology was the most difficult in many years. English was quite difficult. Physics no doubt will be a bastard.

I have also heard that MX2 or 1 had the most difficult test ever.

Shows how subjective this is, bio was the easiest test I've seen English the same and I literally loled when I saw your physics prediction having now done the test which was probably the easiest thing I've ever done. That said I found chemistry to be ridiculously hard.

 

[Galladrim]

What I noticed about this year's exams is that they were harder for the reason that they seemed to want you to think more; there was less "here's a syllabus dot point, enjoy" and more "here's something that isn't particularly hard but you won't have seen it before". Also, the tests seemed to have a narrower focus, which was wildly annoying - such as Economics and policies (so little on globalisation) and Geography and world cities.
\

I agree, To be honest I really prefer it that way as it ensures people actually learn the whole course.

 

[2011_]

I also agree with the above - my exams certainly required you to apply what you knew rather than just regurgitating something from the summary you had written for that dot point. Therefore I wouldn't say they were harder or easier - just different.

 

[someth1ng]

Maths was easier but MX1 was harder.

 

[Haemolymph]

English Paper 1: Same to slightly harder (I stressed because it was my first exam and Belonging to place in Crucible was sh!t)
Paper 2: Pretty easier, but more obscure than usual for a standard english paper.

MX2: Same but jumbled, which made it harder as it put off a lot of people that rely on getting lots of marks in 1-6, because 5 and 6 were atrocious, or maybe 4 and 5. Don't remember.

MX1: Kill me now. The worst. And it was jumbled as well. It would've been half bearable if the difficulty increased as you progressed through instead of being such a mindfuck.

SOR2: Harder. Multiple choice was A LOT worse and MC is usually pretty bad anyway due to the subjective nature of SOR. The short answers in section I were very specific and Section I B wasn't even in the religion and non-religion syllabus. Section II killed my life, specifying people for the whole thing (I do Buddhism, Islam and Christianity, and Hinduism and Judaism were on practices). Section III some were harder, some were the same. Section IV - Kill me now. I bet they will mark this harshly too.

Biology: Don't even joke about that. It was the worst exam EVER. So bad. Just... Horrible. MC was otherworldly for bio, with one question with two answers and others which different textbooks disagree on. Short answer was very skills based and more sciencey than rememberingy. The options were far too specific (at least mine was).

Chemistry: Harder. MC was so bad for me. I usually get like 13-15/15 or 17-20/20 and I got 15/20 this time. The short answer questions were pretty bad, they specified a buffer, the calculations were a lot harder than usual (I think I got one right and I usually get all of them). Question a of Industrial Chemistry was sooo bad. Not even on the syllabus, dilute NaCl threw me. There is no way 2010 compares, I easily got a band 6 doing 2010 under exam conditions and barely trying, I will be lucky to scrape 90 in this paper.

Overall: Tests this year have been harder, especially my options. :/

 

[Haemolymph]

Shows how subjective this is, bio was the easiest test I've seen English the same and I literally loled when I saw your physics prediction having now done the test which was probably the easiest thing I've ever done. That said I found chemistry to be ridiculously hard.

Get out.
Biology was so different from previous years and a lot harder. Do the past papers and tell me it was easier/the same. Although, you might think it was easier because it resembled an easy chemistry exam, but for biology it was harder.

 

[Dubble-u25]

Agreed!
The short answer questions were really weird. Technology X and technology Y?? Thank god I do chemistry otherwise I would be screwed
Chemistry was definitely harder this year compared to last. Just realised that liquid X was concentrated H2SO4 but only wrote down H2SO4. damn! -_-"

 

[Haemolymph]

Agreed!
The short answer questions were really weird. Technology X and technology Y?? Thank god I do chemistry otherwise I would be screwed
Chemistry was definitely harder this year compared to last. Just realised that liquid X was concentrated H2SO4 but only wrote down H2SO4. damn! -_-"

I guessed H2SO4 out of nowhere and wrote random shit, so hopefully I can scab a mark.

 

[4025808]

I think for a lot of subjects the BOS was finally living up to their "no prepared responses" spiel that they've been giving every year. So the questions weren't necessarily harder, just quite narrow (and so if you weren't fully prepared, it came down to luck that you had studied particularly sections).

So basically it ensures that students actually study their texts in-depth, not just get a tutor to write their essay and memorize it. However, module C was pretty much begging for a prepared response, since the question was so generic.

 

[juliastegner]

^Module A was also generic

 

[FTW]

English Adv Paper 1: Easier
English Adv Paper 2: Harder (Due to mod B)
Maths Ex 1: Harder (As the questions were just weirder, and more time consuming)
Maths Ex 2: Harder (Q4 + 5 were strangely difficult - for me at least)
Geography: Harder (more specific short responses and poorly worded long responses)
Physics: I honestly can't judge this, I'm so bad at physics, I would have done better sitting latin extension.

 

[wogboy23]

Level of difficulty of HSC exams is basically the same each year, just with questions reshaped but nonetheless taken directly from the syllabus. This at least applies for most humanities subjects
English Paper I was about the same. The essay question was alright, creative writing "may" use stimulus wtf but still manageable but to be honest, I actually found the short answers more difficult than previous years cos I couldn't sift out many techniques as such
English Paper 2 - easy shit. Module A and C lime omg...generic much? Even module B (well at least for speeches ) was relatively straightforward but still a bit tricky
Ancient History - VERY, and I mean VERY easy compared to past papers. Personality questions made you think a bit and a 15 marker for the short answers was just lol. The Pompeii section however was obviously made so much more easier than last year - particularly multiple choice and that generic 10 mker
English Extension 1 - pretty easy. Basically just regurgitated info. I did science fiction/genre - all my arguments for essay linked to the challenging of humantiy and my story basically revolved around the 'plugging in' in a hyperreal metaverse in suiting to the opening line - "I took a big step. My life will never be the same" ( or something along those lines)
Now for my difficult ones
I felt Modern History was alright - perhaps a bit harder than previous years well at least for the WWI core which was just BS. That multiple choice - fml got like 2 wrong. The personality questions were also strange cos for Speer, I felt I was writing the same thing for both questions. Two essays were fine, information that was just reshaped (especially for that Versailles question for Germany as part of the national study)
Legal Studies - overall deserves a WTF. I felt we were misled overall from the issued Specimen Paper and the trials. That multiple choice was just BS. Got like 2-3 wrong fml (depending on the answer to question 15 I've calculated). Short answers were easy and the essays overall were quite broad and I actually liked how they really made the focus on just manipulating certain information to the question -no prepared answers. Having said that, the 15 marker was BS, even though it was the principal focus of the course which I'm sure many skipped over - it was still general but confusing at first glance

Overall happy - ALL BAND 6'S HERE I COME....doubt it

 

[thesinophile]

test

 

[CecilyMare]

why the fk are we discussing this guise, enjoy your holiday

 

[4025808]

Legal Studies - overall deserves a WTF. I felt we were misled overall from the issued Specimen Paper and the trials. That multiple choice was just BS. Got like 2-3 wrong fml (depending on the answer to question 15 I've calculated). Short answers were easy and the essays overall were quite broad and I actually liked how they really made the focus on just manipulating certain information to the question -no prepared answers. Having said that, the 15 marker was BS, even though it was the principal focus of the course which I'm sure many skipped over - it was still general but confusing at first glance

Legal studies this year made me go a little WTF in me. It was even harder than the independent trial paper. But even then I wouldn't have memorized my responses for legal studies anyway. I reckon the trials were better than the HSC exam tbh. Hoping I can get around an 80-85 raw mark this year.

 

[wogboy23]

Legal studies this year made me go a little WTF in me. It was even harder than the independent trial paper. But even then I wouldn't have memorized my responses for legal studies anyway. I reckon the trials were better than the HSC exam tbh. Hoping I can get around an 80-85 raw mark this year.

what mark do you think would be the minimum for a band 6 in the HSC test (have no idea how scaling, aligning or wtf is or influences)
also, what did you put for q 15 of the multiple choice for legal if I may ask and your reasoning behind it